She is most famous for her role in helping to stop the common practice of infanticide of twins in Okoyong, an area of Cross River State, Nigeria.

[1][2] Mary Mitchell Slessor was born on 2, December 1848 in Gilcomston, Aberdeen, Scotland, to a poor working-class family who could not afford proper education.

[4] By age fourteen, Mary had become a skilled jute worker at the mill, working from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. with just an hour for breakfast and lunch.

[4] Slessor developed an interest in religion, and when a mission was instituted in Quarry Pend (close by the Wishart Church), she wanted to teach.

[5] Slessor started her mission at the age of 27, upon hearing that David Livingstone, the famous missionary and explorer, had died.

After training in Edinburgh, she set sail in the SS Ethiopia on 5 August 1876 with her cousin Robert Mitchell Beedie, a missionary from New Deer in Buchan and arrived at her destination in West Africa just over a month later.

She was warned that they believed in traditional West African religion and had superstitions about women giving birth to twins.

Since Slessor assigned a large portion of her salary to support her mother and sisters in Scotland, she economised by eating the native food.

Issues Slessor confronted as a young missionary included the lack of Western education, as well as widespread human sacrifice at the death of a village elder, who, it was believed, required servants and retainers to accompany him into the next world.

During the next three years, Slessor looked after her mother and sister (who had also fallen ill), and spoke at many churches, sharing stories from the Calabar area.

She helped heal the sick and stop the practice of determining guilt by making the suspects drink poison.

She learned to speak the native Efik language, and made close personal friendships wherever she went, becoming known for her pragmatism and humour.

Slessor continued her focus on evangelism, settling disputes, encouraging trade, establishing social changes and introducing Western education.

Unable to determine which twin was fathered by the evil spirit, the natives often abandoned both babies in clay pots to die.

The fevers eventually weakened Slessor to the point she could no longer walk long distances in the rainforest but had to be pushed along in a handcart.

Nigeria's Governor-General, Sir Frederick Lugard, telegraphed his "deepest regrets" from Lagos and published a warm eulogy in the government gazette.

It states that "She and her four adopted African children were a centre of great attraction and helped to deepen the interest of the whole community in the Foreign Mission work of the Church."

Some of these include: A female hostel in the University of Nigeria Nsukka is named Mary Slessor Hall in her honour.

The note also features a map of Calabar, a lithographic vignette depicting her work with children, and a sailing ship emblem.